Fixer

FIXER

Roderick C. Lankler

ISBN (Print Edition): 978-1-09830-474-4

ISBN (eBook Edition): 978-1-09830-475-1

© 2020. All rights reserved. No part of this publication may be reproduced, distributed, or transmitted in any form or by any means, including photocopying, recording, or other electronic or mechanical methods, without the prior written permission of the publisher, except in the case of brief quotations embodied in critical reviews and certain other noncommercial uses permitted by copyright law.

This is a work of fiction. Any resemblance to actual events or persons,

living or dead, is entirely coincidental

Dedication

To Barbara

who’s greatest gift has been staying married

to me for sixty years

and

to her second greatest gift, our four sons,

Andrew, Douglas, Gregory, and Stephen

.

Table of Contents

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1

After Judge Hastings took his seat overlooking his courtroom, the court clerk shouted, Be seated. As everyone in the courtroom took their seats, Hastings waited for complete silence. He looked around his courtroom, and then down at Assistant District Attorney Ian MacDonald.

Mr. MacDonald, you may make your opening statement.

Ian rose from the prosecutors’ table and walked directly to the jury box where the twelve jurors and four alternates were seated. He carried no notes or other papers. He knew what he wanted to say. He was ready.

"Ladies and gentlemen of the jury, this is a case of rape and murder. A brutal, violent, forceful rape in the back of a van and a murder by strangulation. The victim of this murder, you will learn, was a beautiful, bright, twenty-six-year-old young lady named Mary Rusk. Mary lived on Staten Island with her mother, father and two siblings. Mary worked as a summer intern in one of the large banks headquartered in lower Manhattan. This was a summer job. In the fall she was to begin her first year at the Wharton School of the University of Pennsylvania, one of the nation’s leading business schools.

"You will learn and the people will prove that, on the night of July 30 of this past year, Mary worked late. It was her custom to take the ferry to Staten Island, and on this night, she took her normal route to walk to the ferry. Only it was much later. The streets of lower Manhattan were empty. Empty except for one man—this defendant, Gino Conti. Conti sat in a Dodge Grand Caravan in a vacant parking lot at Cedar Street. As Mary Rusk drew abreast of the lot, this defendant grabbed Mary and forced her into the back of the van. He ripped down her skirt and pantyhose, and he raped Mary. He then took the pantyhose, wrapped it around Mary’s neck and pulled tighter and tighter until Mary was dead.

At around 5:00 AM the next morning, a sanitation truck was moving east on Rector Street when the driver saw what he believed to be a mannequin lying in the middle of the street. As he slowly approached the object, he realized it was not a mannequin. It was a human body. Mary Rusk’s half-naked body had been dumped in the middle of Rector Street. You will hear that the driver of the truck called his supervisor who, in turn, alerted the police. Upon closer inspection, the pantyhose was found so tightly wrapped around Mary’s neck, it was embedded in her skin. You will learn and the people will prove that, as the police responded to Rector Street and began their investigation . . .

Two-and-a-half weeks later the trial ended. It was a disaster.

2

The first bombshell came at about 3:00 PM, two hours after the jury got the case and began its deliberations. The court officers notified everyone that the jury had sent out a note. The judge would be taking the bench in ten minutes.

Word spread fast throughout the Homicide Bureau. A senior trial assistant asked, What the hell is this all about? Isn’t it a little early for a note?

Beats me Al, but duty calls. Ian grabbed his suit coat and his trial file. The smile on his face betrayed the feelings in his bowels.

You better wash your face; you got some mustard there from your sandwich.

Thanks Al. I’m my usual mess.

The fact was that Ian was not usually a mess. He was in good shape: 6’, 150 lbs. He ran marathons and played a respectable game of golf. He was not a fancy dresser, but his suits fit, his pants were pressed and his shoes were well shined. As far as he could see, there were no mustard stains on his tie. His greying temples were striking against the pitch black of the rest of his hair. He was nicely tanned from running and playing golf. There was a distinctive scar by his left ear where a kid threw a fire cracker at him when he was younger. It gave him a bit of a macho look that women loved. They also loved his steel grey eyes and his brilliant white teeth. He was single. He would make a great catch.

He had been in the Homicide Bureau of the New York County District Attorney’s Office for the last seven years and was clearly recognized as the top trial lawyer. He was well respected by the senior pros in the bureau, and the younger assistants loved him. He was always looking for ways to involve the junior people in his trials. Taught by some of the best, he knew it was his duty to pass it on. He got a healthy share of Good luck as he went down the hallway toward the elevator bank.

He was trailed closely by Detective Joseph Jackie, known by all as Robbie, and Detective Eustice H Smith. Smith was never, ever called Eustice. He was just plain Smitty. These were the two detectives who originally caught the mannequin case. They had invested a large portion of the past year finding Conti and getting the case to trial.

Bringing up the rear, scrambling as fast as he could, juggling papers everywhere, was Louie Balzo, a rookie in the Homicide Bureau. This was Louie’s maiden trial voyage, and he looked like he was going to throw up.

When Ian’s group got off the elevator on the twelfth floor, they were met by Nails Ballen, Conti’s lawyer. With Nails was Bunny, his ever-present associate wearing her ever-present mini skirt. Ballen’s real name was Hopewell J. Ballen, but everyone called him Nails. He seemed to like it. He looked like a nail—tall and skinny—with thinning black hair swept back, and reading glasses that he always wore down at the end of his nose.

What do you hear, kid? demanded Nails.

Nothing, Nails. I just got a call that there was a note from the jury and to come up to court.

Bullshit. Those court officers are always giving you ADAs little hints. What have they told you?

That there was a note and the judge would be taking the bench in ten minutes. That was nine-and-a-half minutes ago. I went to the bathroom.

Despite the bathroom you are still full of shit, and besides, what is confidential about a note? Someone’s got to read it.

I have no idea what is going on, but it’s too early for a verdict. They probably want some part of the charge explained to them. Bunny, don’t you think Nails should be more careful of his language in front of you? Bunny rolled her eyes.

Ian went into the austere wood paneled courtroom. It, like the rest of the Criminal Courts Building, reflected the art/deco style. It bore one of those telltale depression era murals all along one side of the courtroom, featuring, naturally, the blindfolded Lady Justice and her scales.

Instead of going to the prosecutor’s table with Louie and the detectives, he went over to Davey Garr’s desk. Davey was the clerk of the court. He’d worked in the courts for a hundred years.

What’s going on, Davey?

Bad news, Davey said. Bad news, he repeated slowly, and left to get the judge. Ian had heard Davey the first time.

When all the jurors were seated, Judge Hastings said, I am in possession of a note submitted to me by Juror Number 1, your foreperson, which I ask be marked court’s Exhibit 21.

That would be 22, your honor, Davey Garr said. We are up to 22.

Whatever. Mark it as court’s Exhibit 22 and hand it to me. It was clear that Judge Hastings was not happy. Hastings took a long, exasperated breath and continued, "The note reads as follows:

‘Your honor, as soon as we began our deliberations, one of the jurors got up from the table and said, You people are on your own on this one, and he pulled a chair over by the window and sat. We asked him what was wrong and he wouldn’t say anything to us other than You are on your own. The rest of us started to discuss how we felt about the case and he just sat there and looked out the window. We asked him if he wanted to share any thoughts or opinions and all he said was You are on your own. We would like some help about what we should do. This note was written by the other eleven of us.’"

Ian, and everyone else in the courtroom, watched the jury as Hastings read the note. Most of the jurors were looking at juror number 11 who sat with his head down and his eyes shut as if he were sleeping.

Louie whispered, I think it’s number 11. He is sitting in the back row toward the right. Louie was proud of himself.

Yep, thanks Louie, Ian acknowledged.

Hastings was clearly pissed. Now listen to me very carefully, ladies and gentlemen of the jury. Each one of you took an oath and swore that you would listen to all the evidence as it was being presented to you in this courtroom. You swore that you would diligently consider that evidence and try to determine where the truth lies. You swore that you would respectfully listen to your fellow jurors, consider their arguments and their positions, calmly and carefully present your own arguments and positions and that you would all attempt to come to a unanimous decision. Now I am charging you that you have an obligation to live up to those promises. You are to go back to the jury room and do just that. All of you. You are now directed to continue your deliberations. The jury filed out of the jury box and out the courtroom door to the jury room.

At 5:30, there was another note. It was essentially the same news, except it was obvious that eleven jurors were in agreement. Nails saw his client going down if juror number 11 caved in and immediately moved for a mistrial. Hastings knew 11 to 1s. He’d experienced them many times before. He denied the motion for a mistrial, and ordered the jury to continue deliberating, confident that the holdout would buckle.

Two days, six notes and eight mistrial motions later, it was clear that number 11 was not budging. There would not be a verdict, and a furious Hastings declared a mistrial and excused the jury. Two-and-a-half weeks of trial went down the drain.

Ian asked his detectives to bring the Rusk family down to his office.

3

Maggie Rusk, Mary’s mother, led her family into Ian’s office. She was a wreck. She’d been crying, and kept running her left hand through the left side of her hair as if she couldn’t get it back far enough. She was a fragile woman weighing barely a hundred pounds. She was an immaculate and meticulous dresser, which made her present condition all the more striking. In Ian’s many dealings with the Rusk family, she was always courteous and pleasant. She treated Ian as if he were her son. Ian thought that she was probably in her late forties or early fifties. Her three kids were born one right after another: first Mary, then Adele a year later and Brian a year after that. Pete Rusk, Mary’s father, told Ian that he received special permission from their parish priest, Father Joe, to get a vasectomy in order to keep Maggie’s sanity. Maggie’s sanity was not doing too well at the moment. She had a white hanky in her right hand. She had coiled part of it around her thumb, and when her left hand wasn’t busy with her hair, it was winding and unwinding the hanky.

Ian was scurrying around trying to make room for people to sit.

My God, this is never going to end, is it? Maggie asked no one in particular. Does this mean we have to start all over at the beginning again?

Ma, let’s let Ian catch his breath and then he can explain everything to us. Adele was patting her mother’s busy hands as she spoke. Adele was twenty-five, in the second year of her medical internship at New York Presbyterian Hospital and a knockout. Detective Smith would say, She is hot, but Ian had asked him to control himself and to stop using that expression to describe her. Besides having a great body, Adele was pretty. Her long blond hair was pulled back in a pony tail with a blue band that matched the blue of her eyes. Her face was striking. She was a Grace Kelly look-alike. In addition to all of that, she was brilliant, caring and kind.

Everything that Adele was, Brian wasn’t. Overweight and unkempt, he possessed a big mouth from which very little of any worth spouted. He was the personification of ready, fire, aim. Over the months, Ian had become very impatient with Brian, not because he was stupid, but because he was stupid and thought he was smart. It was hard to believe that he was the brother of two such bright and talented girls as Mary and Adele. Ian could see, as a fuming Brian entered the room, that this wasn’t going to be pretty.

Pete Rusk was the last of the family to take a seat. In typical fashion, he immediately said, Ian, before you say anything, we just want to say again how grateful we are to ya for . . . not only the tremendous professional job ya did with this trial . . . but the incredible way ya have treated my family. I personally am beholden to ya and don’t know how I can ever repay ya.

He rose from his chair and went over to Ian’s desk and extended his hand. Ian grabbed his hand and said, Pete, thank you. I don’t know how this happened, but something’s fishy. We will get to the bottom of it.

I know how it happened. You never should have picked that idiot juror, blurted out Brian. Right after you picked him, I told you you shouldn’t have picked him and I was right.

Brian, you also told me I should not have picked three other jurors and they all obviously voted for conviction, so give it a rest.

Yes Brian, this is no time for ya comments. Just button it, said Pete. Brian turned away in disgust and concentrated on a piece of peeling paint on the window sill.

Pete was retired from the New York City Comptroller’s Office where for the last twenty years he had run the police department’s pension program. He essentially made sure that the retiring New York City police officers got what they were supposed to get when they retired. All the police knew him, knew what he did and they all loved him. Mary’s murder resonated among the police force as if she were one of their own.

Pete was a massive man. He played football when at Fordham University and had stayed in shape since graduating many years ago. Over 6’6 tall, he kept his weight at around 200 lbs. by daily visits to the gym not far from their home in a pleasant section of Staten Island. Pete’s one fault was not that he was devoutly religious, but that he wore his religion on his sleeve. This sometimes caused others discomfort. Ya know, Ian, that I believe the Good Lord works in mysterious ways, and this little setback today is just Him testing us. We have to let His will be done."

You may be right, Pete, but that doesn’t make it any easier, a depressed Ian replied.

It’s all right, Ian. The Good Lord sent ya to help Mary and us, and ya doing a wonderful job. God bless ya.

Thank you, Pete. Let’s talk for a minute about what all this means. First of all, Conti is back in his cell. He is not going anywhere. Secondly, Judge Hastings has put the case on for Monday morning at 10:00 AM. He is going to ask what our intentions are, and I am going to tell him I am ready to move the case for retrial immediately. We have no idea what Nails might do. He is going to want more money for another trial. He may look to get out of the case. He will be begging for a plea. He and Conti know they barely escaped a conviction.

But why would he think he could get a plea? Adele asked softly. He knows that we would all be against a lesser plea.

Let him plead to murder and rape with consecutive sentences, chimed in Brian.

Lawyers are always looking for a plea. Nails will now tell me that he has the advantage of knowing our entire case. Which is true. I know how awful it is reliving Mary’s death. I just want to make sure we are all on the same page and that we are going to trial again. No plea. Correct?

Correct, was the almost unanimous reply.

I don’t know if I can stand it, Maggie Rusk whispered. It is so horrible to hear that testimony about finding her and the autopsy. Why not take some sort of plea and get out of here? Get on with our lives. Nothing is going to bring her back. She started to sob. Adele ran over to put her arm around her mother.

Shit, said Brian as he walked out of the room.

Mr. Rusk leaned forward in his chair, arms on his knees, hands clasped as if in prayer and just shook his head.

Detective Smith came into the room and asked Ian, Could they just have a seat out in the waiting area for one minute? There is something I should tell you. When the Rusk family left, Smitty closed Ian’s door. He explained, After you left, I stayed up in the courtroom because I heard Judge Hastings direct the court officers to grab juror number 11 and bring him into the courtroom. I wasn’t sure what was going to happen. Hastings cleared the courtroom, but he let me stay. He asked 11 to explain himself. I got to tell you, Ian, it was as if a lawyer wrote out the answer for him. Hastings was ready to carve him a new asshole, but when 11 was finished, Hastings was speechless.

Ian collapsed in his chair. Damn Smitty, what did 11 say?

"He covered himself. He said that during the jury selection process, he listened very carefully, and when he was questioned, he answered all the questions truthfully. He said that when he was sworn in as a juror, he took the oath seriously and he believes he lived up to his oath. He said that as he watched the evidence being presented, a feeling grew that there was a conspiracy going on to frame Conti because he was of Italian heritage. He said that he became convinced of this when he heard your summation, Ian. The judge’s charge put him over the top. He knew when he went into the jury room that only his courage could keep Conti from being railroaded. Now what do you do about that? He may be nuts, but you can’t lock him up for that."

No, you can’t. I’ll be damned. What did Hastings say?

Nothing at first. Then Hastings shook his head and said, ‘That is ridiculous. You have wasted everyone’s time. Get out of here.’

When 11 left the courtroom, there was a man and a woman waiting for him, and they all went down in an elevator together. I took another elevator down to the lobby and saw the three of them get into a limo out on Centre Street and head north. I tried but couldn’t get a plate number.

4

The driver of the limo carrying number 11 and the two others took a convoluted route to the north-bound entrance of the FDR Drive at the Brooklyn Bridge. He was making sure that he wasn’t being followed. Twenty-seven minutes later, he pulled up to the door of a warehouse a block away from Arthur Avenue in the Bronx. Almost immediately, the overhead door began to rise. The limo was inside before the door reached the top, stopped and began to make its descent. Once inside, the three passengers headed for the elevator that took them to the fourth-floor offices. Number 11 was left in the reception area, while the man and woman went into the inner office.

He is perfectly calm and cool, the woman told the rotund man seated in an overstuffed recliner. Nothing to worry about from this end.

The rotund man grunted and said, Give him this attaché case and get him up to our plane at Westchester County Airport. Get him on it and out of here. Tell him to follow the instructions, and in a week he will get the balance of his money.

In less than an hour, number 11 was walking up the steps of a private Gulfstream jet parked at the general aviation hangar at Westchester County Airport. He had his own crew and flight attendant. No one else was on the plane. In a little over four hours, he was pulling up to the entrance of the Crescent Moon Cove Resort in Jamaica, West Indies, and a half hour after that, he was in his ocean front villa. An attaché case full of money lay on the bed. He was reading an instruction sheet:

"If you expect to live and to receive the rest of your money, you will do the following:

Check into the villa that has been provided for you. Don’t go off the property. Don’t make any phone calls. Don’t write any letters. Don’t generate any form of contact withanyone.

Eat all your meals at the resort restaurants. Charge them to your account, which you will pay in full when you leave, using the cash we have given you.

If you want to purchase anything, you will purchase it at the resort store and charge the items to your account.

On Friday, you will go to the resort store at 4:45 PM. Don’t be late. The store closes at 5:00 PM. You will ask for a fifth of Dewar’s Black Label scotch. After you receive it, you will ask for some Bruner’s pretzel snacks and for the package that has been left for Mr. Ralph. That package will contain the balance of your money.

On Saturday, you will pay your bill and check out of the resort. You will go wherever you want to go as long as it is not back to New York City.

DESTROY THESE INSTRUCTIONS."

The details about picking up the package at the resort store were new. The rest of the instructions had been drilled into him. He had been promised enough money to keep him comfortable for the rest of his life.

5

Leroy P. Hastings was the most senior judge of the trial court. His twenty years on the bench would soon end. He would be retiring at the end of the year. There was very little he hadn’t seen. He’d paid his political dues as a young lawyer working with the Legal Aid Society, been appointed to the lower Criminal Court bench by the mayor and then promoted to the top trial court.

Because of his seniority, he occupied the largest and grandest chambers on the top floor of the Criminal Court Building. He was seated behind his large desk smoking a cigar. There was a scotch on the rocks in a fishbowl-sized glass sitting at his elbow. He always wore bright red braces in addition to a wide brown leather belt and claimed, You can never be too sure when it comes to keeping your pants on.

He also wore an oversized bow tie that he tied himself. His ties made a loud paisley statement under his wrinkled chin. The only things larger than his bow ties were his eyebrows. They almost ran up to his receding hair line. Judge Hastings’ eyebrows reminded Ian of Brillo Pads.

When Ian called, the judge invited him to come up for a chat. Ian had tried several murder cases before Judge Hastings. Both men respected each other.

There is something that doesn’t pass the smell test about this, Ian. I have seen holdouts on other juries, and they are nervous and scared. This guy was just too cool. Most holdouts think they are about to have the shit kicked out of them by the other jurors. It was as if this guy knew that if he kept his mouth shut and just sat there, nothing would happen to him. He also knew that if he gave me the right answers, there would be nothing I could do about it. It is almost as if he’d been coached.

"Maybe he was—I mean, coached. If you were going to put someone on a jury, to hang that jury, you’d want him to be prepared. You’d want him to know how to go about it, to know how to resist